Early sociolinguistic studies in England were mainly conducted in the geographical South of the country, e.g. Trudgill in Norwich (1974), Cheshire in Reading (1982), Britain in the Fens (1997), and Kerswill and Williams in Milton Keynes (2000). However, around the turn of the millennium, interests shifted more and more towards investigating varieties in the North. The biennual Northern English workshop, and the edited volumes by Hickey (2015) and Beal and Hancil (2017) are witnesses of the increased research into variation and change processes in Northern English varieties. Meanwhile, research in the South was dominated by the discussions around the nebulous term Estuary English (Rosewarne, 1984), and the two large-scale Multicultural London English projects by Jenny Cheshire and Paul Kerswill (e.g. Cheshire et al., 2011). As a result, for a long time, research of linguistic variation in other Southern English variety areas was more or less neglected (with the exception of extensive research by Dave Britain in the Fenlands). However, in the last decade we have seen some increasing interest in research on Southern varieties which is reflected in the number of research activities involving Southern English varieties. A workshop on historical and present-day aspects of Southern English was held at the University of Brighton in March 2014, and this was to run again at Cambridge University in 2015, and at University College London in 2016. Wright (2018) subsequently published an edited volume on linguistic research in the South of England. In April 2017, we organised a language variation and change workshop at the University of Suffolk, which, once again, focused on Southern English varieties. We became aware that there is a young generation of linguists all working on variation and change in the South of England, and wanted to promote and foster this interest. Hence, plans were made to compile this special issue to showcase and draw attention to the diverse range of exciting work which is taking place in this much under-studied region. The South is a diverse geographical area which can be divided into the South East and the South West, and, within these broader categories, we can begin to distinguish more specific geographical areas. The South East, i.e. London and the Home Counties, is characterized by being the most populous area, with a diverse population and high mobility. This is true, in particular, for the well known ‘commuter belt’, that is high intensity regions of people commuting to London for work from surrounding areas (e.g. Britain, 2010). Hence, the South East is typically thought of as highly mobile, which, inevitably, has repercussions on language use. Large-scale dialect levelling, i.e. the reduction of dialect features, led much of the

中文翻译：

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英格兰南部的英语

英国早期的社会语言学研究主要在该国的地理南部进行，例如诺里奇的特鲁德吉尔（1974 年）、雷丁的柴郡（1982 年）、沼泽地的英国（1997 年）以及米尔顿凯恩斯的克斯威尔和威廉姆斯（2000 年）。然而，在世纪之交，人们的兴趣越来越多地转向研究北方的品种。两年一次的北方英语研讨会以及 Hickey（2015 年）和 Beal 和 Hancil（2017 年）的编辑卷是对北方英语品种变异和变化过程的研究增加的见证。与此同时，南方的研究主要围绕模糊术语的讨论河口英语（Rosewarne，1984），以及 Jenny Cheshire 和 Paul Kerswill 的两个大型多元文化伦敦英语项目（例如 Cheshire 等人，2011）。因此，长期以来，其他南部英语变种地区的语言变异研究或多或少被忽视（戴夫英国在芬兰的广泛研究除外）。然而，在过去十年中，我们看到对南方品种研究的兴趣日益浓厚，这反映在涉及南方英国品种的研究活动数量上。2014 年 3 月在布莱顿大学举办了一场关于南方英语历史和现代方面的研讨会，并于 2015 年在剑桥大学和 2016 年在伦敦大学学院再次举办。赖特（2018 年）随后发表了一篇编辑了英格兰南部语言学研究卷。2017 年 4 月，我们在萨福克大学组织了一次语言变化和变化研讨会，该研讨会再次，专注于英国南部品种。我们意识到在英格兰南部有年轻一代的语言学家都在研究变化和变化，并希望促进和培养这种兴趣。因此，计划编制本期特刊，以展示并引起人们对在这个研究不足的地区进行的各种激动人心的工作的关注。南方是一个多样化的地理区域，可以分为东南部和西南部，在这些更广泛的类别中，我们可以开始区分更具体的地理区域。东南部，即伦敦和本郡，是人口最多的地区，人口多样化，流动性高。这是真的，特别是对于众所周知的“通勤带”，这是人们从周边地区通勤到伦敦工作的高强度地区（例如英国，2010）。因此，东南部通常被认为是高度流动的，这不可避免地会对语言使用产生影响。大规模的方言平整，即方言特征的缩减，导致了很多